The Petefish Post

Saturday, November 12, 2016

Ella update

It is no secret that Ella has stolen the hearts of many so I thought I'd share some of her cutest recent photos. I think my Mom likes her just a little bit. ;)

New haircut!

Mom's helper while cleaning to garage

Santa Barbara

We woke up and quickly went outside to see the harbor in the early morning light. This whole being on EST things works out well for having early mornings without the sleepiness!

Morning boat checks

We'd heard great things about Santa Barbara so we packed up and hit the road to have breakfast on the beach at a place I found on TripAdvisor. We were not disappointed! We took seats right by the beach and enjoyed watching little guys learn to bodyboard and pups run around.

Breakfast with a VIEW!

We enjoy long walks on the beach...

Gorgeous beach

10 years and still going strong!

Big waves!

The locals we met on the beach kept telling us how it was not usually this warm in mid-November so we'd lucked out. We totally agreed. It was a wonderful time hanging out on the off-leash dog beach!

Finally found a coffee big enough...

We finally left the dog beach to go explore Santa Barbara's downtown. It was really well done. We were a little disappointed that it was just a cool presentation of stores you already have at home, but it was fun to walk around for a bit and soak it all in nonetheless.

Pre-hike excitement

We read about a great in-town hike so we meandered through neighborhoods of million dollar houses to get to this trail. We met some friendly folks along the way, but for the most part the trail was ours. I mention this because I had to pee and there were no restrooms so the lack of people came in handy. ;) I'm getting pretty good at "peeing in the woods."

At the top exhaustion

Inspiration point lived up to its name

This was super steep going down
It was ZERO fun.

The hike was fairly simple except that one part went straight up. That's not a problem going up. Going down, though, is much harder for me now. My knee is not strong enough to stabilize itself so it gets weak and then my hip gets weak and it is all very painful. In hindsight I should have stayed at the bottom but I'm stubborn and I didn't want to miss out!

We decided we'd better get on the road so that we did not miss sunset on the beach like we'd planned. We made it to Pismo Beach to see a cloudy but still lovely sunset. The town itself wasn't quite our style as it was pretty touristy so we didn't stay long before heading up to San Luis Obispo ("SLO").

Pismo Beach

Pismo again

We loved our hotel in SLO as they upgraded us to a suite and its location was ideal. The downtown area of SLO was incredible. We loved it. It was a great college town (home of Cal Poly). We stopped into a local pub for dinner because they had live music being played which is a personal favorite of mine. The performers even let you text in song requests so I, naturally, requested they play "Hotel California" since we were in Cali and all. When they played it I was elated and quickly took them a $5 tip for helping make my night a great one.

That was about enough activity for one day so we headed back to the room for the night. Jackson got to watch the end of the Indiana basketball game and they beat Kansas so he was elated. I think the poor kid misses having cable at home! ;) It was a wonderful day and we are off to spend our Saturday exploring Big Sur.

Friday, November 11, 2016

LAX to Malibu to Ventura

We caught a mid-afternoon direct flight from Indy so we got to LAX at 4:00. That was just in time to sit in rush hour traffic! We have NO idea how people deal with that daily. Luckily the scenery was pretty and we only took 1.5 hours to go 22 miles. Yep.

Anyway, we went for a quick dinner that evening at a place called Sharky's. It was like Qdoba but all organic, healthier and better- ha! We both got meals for under $20 which is incredible by California standards.

SO GOOD!

We spent the evening in Woodland Hills (a suburb of LA) just to get a jump on the coastal drive. We got caught in traffic again going from Woodland Hills to Malibu. It was so intense. Again with we have no idea how people deal with the traffic out here on a regular basis. They need to figure
something out with the madness. Anyway, we made it to Malibu and it was LOVELY!

It isn't vacation without hot cocoa

We stopped in at a local chain called Marmalade Cafe. It was superb!

Chorizo and eggs...YUM!

We hopped across the street from breakfast to see the beach. We'd seen evidence that a lot of surfers were in the area and I LOVE watching surfers.

Gorgeous morning

Views from the beach

How cool is this old beach house?!

Petefish.

I'd always wanted to see Pepperdine University's campus so we headed there next. The views from campus were unparalleled. They should be considered a year of tuition plus room and board is a cool $65,000. YEP!

Chapel and the ocean...awesome

It was a really, really hot day. It was 90 degrees and full sun! We wanted to hike Corral Canyon anyway. That was a mistake. We made it a mile up and had to turn around. It was just too hot to go on. The views along the way were amazing, though.

Corral Canyon views

Point Dume State Beach

We decided we'd be better served by spending some time at Point Dume State Beach. It was a really nice, HUGE beach. Those Pepperdine kids are sure spoiled to live in this area!! We eventually made our way up to Ventura for the evening. We stayed on the harbor with a great view of all the sailboats. Jackson LOVES sailboats!

Happy boy with boats!

The sunset over the harbor was amazing. Our room had an enormous balcony so we soaked it all in.

Sunset...LOVE

We're still on Eastern time so we grabbed a quick dinner at Chipotle (we're on a Mexican kick) before calling it an early night. I'm talking like 8 p.m. Cali time. What can I say? We're getting old. ;)

Monday, November 7, 2016

The big 1-0!

MacKenzie brings a lot of joy to our lives so we had a great time celebrating her 10th birthday! We started on Friday evening with a trip to Handel's Ice Cream to get her a pup cone. They're free, small and she LOVES them!

Pup cone at Handel's! YUM!

Saturday she helped us put the bathroom back together and clean the house. OK, she hated that part of the weekend due to the hammering and the vacuum.

In good news, she got to run around Susie's yard while we raked leaves on Sunday. She loves a good pile of leaves! We then had a little family coffee date sitting outside so that all three of us could hang out. She got lots of attention there which doesn't hurt. ;)

Coffee date

The squad

Gazing out the window

She even got mail today on her actual birthday. Susie found an edible rawhide card! She has not bitten into it quite yet, but it was just adorable!

An edible card!

She got treats on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday! She's now officially on a diet!

The best gift this girl could get is a little tennis ball action so Jackson came home between being in Muncie and heading to Bedford for the evening to play with her. What a good poppa!

Then he almost caught her beard on fire so there's that! ;)

She ended the day with a long walk on the Monon with Amber and me. I think she had an awesome birthday weekend. She deserves it!

Sunday, November 6, 2016

JUST GO!

One of my very favorite ladies was kind enough to purchase this passport cover for me from Noonday Collection. It was made by artisans in Haiti and it is just gorgeous. I cannot wait to break it in our upcoming trips to Canada, Australia, New Zealand and China!!

THANK YOU SO MUCH!!! I LOVE IT!!! You are just the sweetest and we are all lucky to know YOU!

Bathroom reno

Jackson made the mistake of mentioning that he thought it would be easy to redo our main floor (2nd) half bathroom. That was all the inspiration I needed to start the project!

We spent way too much time in tile stores before finally settling on one. WAY TOO MUCH TIME!

Then we started the project before really busy weeks of work and traveling so it ended up being over a month to get this little bathroom finished. It was nice because I could just shut the door and pretend the mess wasn't there. :) We have 3 other bathrooms so other than having to hit the stairs to use a restroom when needed, we really didn't notice it being out of service.

I forgot to take before photos, but it was just square tiles and the walls were all light gray. We added new plank style tile and a dark gray accent wall to warm it up. We still need a new window treatment and we're still working on a border for the mirror to match the map on the wall, but at least it is functional again.

Jackson is so manly! He ripped out the old tile, re-tiled, painted, hung the new light fixture, you name it. I helped where I could, but let's be real between being injured and the room being small my main job was to keep things tidy and bring tools when needed. He first refused to wear shoes while working and promptly dropped an entire tile on his big toe. After that shoes were worn. His toe was not broken but it was intensely sore for some of our trips- I'd feel badly but I'd asked 100 times for him to put on shoes.

A text conversation with my Mom- ha!

Ripping out the old tile

Old tile out! New cement board IN!

Early morning painting

MacK helping out

Setting the tile

Waiting for it to dry

What happens when a tile falls on your bare foot

Grout

NOW he wears shoes

Accent wall

BIG MAN!

Finish product!

Still working on a mirror frame, but super close

We planned to do more bathroom remodeling but those may have to wait since this one took longer than planned and was rather messy! ;) It made the room feel much more custom and we got it done for under $500 so we are super pleased.

Random...

Little Ms. Ella (my Mom and Guy's new pup) has come by a couple of times to play. She's just a doll! MacKenzie doesn't love sharing the spotlight just yet, though. ;) Most of these photos were just too adorable not to share!